Horror Show: Hollywood vs. Silicon Valley

[Commentary] Washington regulating the Internet is akin to a gorilla playing a Stradivarius. Yet many legislators are being urged to play by lobbyists for Hollywood, perhaps the most technology-intolerant industry.

The Motion Picture Association of America is the leading proponent for legislative proposals with ostensibly benign titles—the Stop Online Piracy Act in the House and the Protect Intellectual Property Act in the Senate. These bills would go so far to protect copyright that they would strangle the Internet with regulation. The Web would be transformed from a permissive technology where innovation is welcome to one where websites are shut down first, questions asked later. The legislation has bipartisan support and could come up for a vote before the end of the year. If it passes, the government will take down an entire website when a copyright holder claims an infringement online. A violation could be a single link on a single page, such as user-generated content that includes a movie clip or song lyric. It would also be unlawful for a site to "avoid confirming a high probability" of infringement. This is legalese to make websites responsible for anything posted on them or potentially posted on them by third parties. Payment providers, ad networks and search engines would get infringement notices barring them from working with these sites, which would put the sites out of business before any violation is proven. Silicon Valley has belatedly realized it must fight the new proposals.